SANF23 no 19
President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who was declared the winner of the 23-24 August general elections in Zimbabwe, says it is time for the country to move on and focus on its growth and development agenda.
In the final tally of results announced by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) on 26 August, President Mnangagwa of the Zanu PF party polled 2,350,711 votes, amounting to 52.6 percent of total valid votes cast.
His closest competitor Nelson Chamisa of the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) garnered 1,967,343 44 votes, which is 44 percent of total valid votes cast.
Zimbabwe’s electoral laws say that the winner for the presidential election must have at least 50 percent plus one of the valid votes cast to avoid a run-off election.
Voter turnout was 68.9 percent of the 6,623,511 registered voters, according to ZEC.
Zanu PF has accepted the final election results in which it maintained its majority in the National Assembly, winning 136 seats out of 210, while CCC won 73. A by-election will be held in one constituency for which one of the contestants died after nomination day.
The opposition CCC has accepted the outcome of the National Assembly polls, but is disputing the presidential election results.
Accepting the results, President Mnangagwa said he was “humbled by the trust and confidence that you, my fellow country men and women have reposed on me, to once again serve as President of our great country, Zimbabwe.”
“There is much more work to be done. Together, as one united people we shall continue on the growth trajectory witnessed over the last five years, no one and no place will be left behind,” President Mnangagwa said.
“There are no winners or losers, but one united people of Zimbabwe. Thus far, we have shamed our detractors who wished to see us divided and in turmoil.”
The CCC has insisted that presidential election results as announced by ZEC were inaccurate, claiming the party’s candidate had won.
“We have won this election. We are the leaders. We are even surprised why Mnangagwa has been declared a leader,” Chamisa said.
The party is however yet to make public its own results to prove its claim.
Most of the other 11 presidential candidates have already endorsed the results.
In the last elections held in 2018, President Mnangagwa got 50.8 percent of the vote against Chamisa’s 44.3 percent.
International observer missions have described the polls as orderly, transparent, peaceful and well conducted. This is despite setbacks that ZEC faced in terms of distribution of election materials to a few polling stations in three out of 10 provinces.
In their interim reports, the election observers highlighted the positive as well as shortcomings that need to be improved for future elections.
The positives included that polling stations were clearly labelled and that the set up in polling stations allowed for secrecy of the vote. Separation of queues that allowed people with special needs and the elderly to be served first as well as presence of security agents to maintain order was also praised by most.
Issues that were raised for consideration include early provision of the voters roll to stakeholders, fair access to public media by all political parties, regular communication with voters on the electoral process, recruitment of polling officials outside of the civil service,
exemption of local observers from paying accreditation fees, and implementation of gender quotas at political party level to increase the participation by women.
Observer missions have also advised that political parties which are not satisfied with the outcome should pursue remedial measures as set out by the country’s laws.
In a preliminary report issued after observing the elections up to completion of the voting process but before the counting commenced, a combined observer mission from the African Union and Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa said: “The 2023 harmonised elections were conducted, up to the counting process, in a generally peaceful and transparent manner despite logistical challenges with the availability and distribution of local authority ballot papers in some areas.”
A Palestinian observer mission, which was led by Hisham Kuhail, the chief electoral officer of the Central Elections Commission of Palestine, said the “voting process followed international standards.”
In its interim report on the elections, the Southern African Development Community Electoral Observer Mission (SEOM) said the pre-election and voting phases were “peaceful, and calm.”
The SEOM however appeared to criticise some of Zimbabwe’s laws and previous verdicts made by the judiciary concerning different electoral matters. It concluded that “some aspects of the harmonised elections fell short of the requirements of the Constitution of Zimbabwe, the Electoral Act, and the SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections (2021).”
In response, the Zimbabwean government has said while it welcomes “constructive and progressive comments”, the SEOM was delving into matters that were beyond its mandate.
“It is our understanding that SADC respects the sovereignty of Member States and that SEOM as its subsidiary operates within the confines of the constitutions and laws of Member States, which are passed by sovereign Parliaments. We do not believe it is in the remit of SEOM to question or interfere in Member States Constitutions, laws, and court decisions passed by their sovereign democratic institutions,” said Acting Foreign Affairs Minister, Professor Amon Murwira, who met with SADC Ambassadors to Zimbabwe.
“We believe SEOM, as our institution, had all avenues open to interrogate, verify and validate information before it was published, in line with SADC cherished values and principles of transparency, impartiality and non-partisanship. Unfortunately, in some areas cited in the report, this did not happen resulting in the views of a partisan nature being presented in the preliminary report as facts.”
Zimbabwe is one of four Member States of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) holding general elections this year. The others are the Kingdom of Eswatini in September, Madagascar in November and the DRC in December.
Deployment of the SEOM is part of the SADC peer to peer review mechanism to monitor the holding of elections in line with national laws and the SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections adopted in 2004.
The main objective of the SADC Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections is to promote the holding and observation of democratic elections based on the shared values and principles of democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights enshrined in the SADC Treaty signed in Windhoek, Namibia in 1992. sardc.net
